A Study on Sainsbury’s: Investigating Organizational Culture Impact

This project investigates the impact of organizational culture on business performance, focusing on Sainsbury's Plc, a leading UK retailer. The project aims to understand the importance of organizational culture, determine different types of cultures adopted by retail businesses, analyze how culture affects performance, and recommend improvements for Sainsbury's. It employs a literature review and impact analysis to gain deeper knowledge. The project also includes a timescale for task completion and an STP analysis of Sainsbury's marketing strategy. Furthermore, it examines the impact of organizational culture on various aspects of Sainsbury's, including business, employees, environment, and society, while also considering constraints. The study concludes by highlighting the crucial role of organizational culture in Sainsbury's success and provides recommendations for future growth based on identified strategic issues.

PROJECT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
How the objective will be achieved.............................................................................................3
Timescale.....................................................................................................................................4
Brief Background of the topic......................................................................................................4
Background Research: Literature Review...................................................................................5
Marketing or market entry strategy of Sainsbury’s.....................................................................6
Impact Analysis...........................................................................................................................7
12 Constraints..............................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Organization culture is the management concept which state the behaviour or attitude of
employee based on environment of company. In the present project, the impact of organization
culture over the business performance will be selected in order to analyse its impact over retain
sector and Sainsbury Plc. Sainsbury Plc is one of the leading and third largest retail organization
in UK that provide various grocery and merchandised items to its customers (Chatterjee, Pereira
and Bates, 2018). The reason behind the selection of this topic for the present research is such
that organization culture is one of the biggest area which have direct and huge impact over the
performance of business, employee, environment as well as society. The organization culture
increases employee motivation, productivity and company performance as well as profitability.
Aim of the project
The aim is to investigate what kind of organizational structure does the firms within the retail
sector of UK are adopting to improvise their performance – A study on Sainsbury’s
Objectives of the project
 To understand the importance of organizational culture for the improvement of retail
business’s performance.
 To determine different types of organizational culture that the retail businesses usually
adopt.
 To analyze how organizational culture affects the performance of the business like
Sainsbury’s.
 To state the organizational culture that Sainsbury’s has adopted and make recommendations
for better culture that could improvise their overall performance.
How the objective will be achieved
In order to achieve the objective of the present projects, the proper schedule planning is
need to be done. The schedule planning helps in tracking the tasks and activities on a regular
basis and identifying whether there is any issue affecting the achievement of objective of project.
For this, the timeline will be prepared in the present project. Further, in order to achieve the
objective of project, the goals will be break down into smaller parts so that team able to measure
the specific objective achievement with the final goal or aim achievement. Lastly, literature
review and impact analysis will be done in proper way in order to gain deeper knowledge of
research topic and ultimately achieve the objectives of the project. The reason behind conducting
literature review in the current project is that it helps in gaining the deeper knowledge on topic

“impact of organization culture on business performance (Thirusanku, 2021). Hence, in order to
achieve objective, understand important of organizational culture and analyse impact of culture
over retail sector performance, the literature review will be conducted. This is one of the best
way to achieve present project objectives.
Timescale
Tasks Description of work Start Date End Date
1 Review and discussion of chosen
company
March 26, 2022 March 26, 2022
2 Development of aims and objectives March 27, 2022 March 27, 2022
3 Determination of ways through which
objectives will be achieved
March 27, 2022 March 27, 2022
4 Statement of background of the topic March 28, 2022 March 28, 2022
5 Evaluation of existing literature for
secondary data collection
March 29, 2022 March 30, 2022
6 Collection of data March 31, 2022 March 31, 2022
7 Statement of marketing strategy of
Sainsbury’s (STP analysis)
April 1, 2022 April 2, 2022
8 Analysis of impact of the topic on
business, environment and society
April 3, 2022 April 3, 2022
9 Constraint analysis April 4, 2022 April 5, 2022
10 Concluding the findings April 6, 2022 April 6, 2022
11 Made recommendations for further
growth on the basis strategic issues
identified
April 6, 2022 April 6, 2022
12 Project completion April 6, 2022 April 6, 2022
Brief Background of the topic
Organizational culture is the belief, values and environment of the company that promote
the way the people or employee of company behave with each other. In the present world,
organizational culture has huge impact over the performance of business For example, the
positive organization culture leads to business success and negative organization culture leads to
low employee engagement as well as poor business performance (Alzahmi and Ibrahim, 2021).
Hence, for the present project, the impact of organization culture over Sainsbury performance
has been chosen. This helps in identifying the organization culture usually adopt by retail
businesses of UK.

Background Research: Literature Review
Importance of organizational culture for retail business performance improvement
As per the opinion of Chatterjee, Pereira and Bates (2018) the organizational culture
plays vital role in creating a positive organization environment for the people working in
organization. The organizational culture is important for retail business improvement because it
defines retail sector companies internal as well as external identity. The strong and positive
organizational culture has helped the retail sector as well as the businesses in increasing their
employee productivity, improving their health and wellness and reducing the turnover and
absenteeism rate. The overall benefit of strong organizational culture to retail sector is that they
able to frame a positive and strong brand reputation and image in the market. It is also important
for increasing customer satisfaction, level of innovation and retention rates of employee within
the retail sector or businesses. However, as per the opinion of Pathiranage (2019) organization
culture sometime leads to the employee resistance. The employee unable to achieve their targets
on time because they started focusing more on organization culture rather than performance and
productivity improvement. Hence, it is important for the management to keep close eye over
their employee while creating a positive and strong organization culture in retail businesses.
Type of organizational culture usually adopt by retail sector businesses
As stated by Fitria (2018) hierarchy and control organizational culture is a type of culture
which is usually adopted by the retail sector businesses where management is made up of various
levels. With the help of this culture, retail businesses able to manage the smooth function of its
business. It is because here each employee have one supervisor who guide them about how to
work, what to work. The employee need to report to their supervisor or manager under hierarchy
culture. However, on the other hand, Soomro and Shah (2019) has argued that this culture is not
good for retail businesses because of poor flexibility, communication barrier and organizational
disunity drawbacks. The retail sector business rather than using the hierarchy adopt clan and
collaborative organizational culture to encourage their employee. With the help of this culture,
the employee of retail business able to complete their work on time and in high quality. It is
because under this culture each employee consider their co-worker a friend and help other in
completing their work. The benefit of clan organizational culture is high employee engagement
in decision-making and gathering innovative ideas of employee for business success.

As per the opinion of Kawiana and et.al. (2018) the strong leadership is one of the most
significant type of organization culture that is used by the retail sector. It is because this helps in
improving the skills and personal development of employees. Under this theory, the retail
businesses need to provide proper training and development to its employee so that they can
learn new skill including technology. This will keep the employee updated of all the internal as
well as external changes. Here, the retails businesses provide training to employee on diversity
and inclusion as well.
Analysis of organizational culture impact over performance of retail sector businesses
According to the view of Ameen, Ahmed and Abd Hafez (2018) the impact of
organization culture over retail sector performance is depends upon whether the culture is
positive or negative and strong or poor. In case if the culture of retail sector businesses is strong,
healthy or positiver than this leads to increase in performance of business both in term of finance
and values. But on the other hand, if the culture of retail sector businesses is poor and negative
than this leads to low employee productivity and company performance. The impact of
organization culture over the retail businesses is rise in productivity, achievement of business
goals and improved business performance. It is because organization culture develop positive
relation between the employees and enhance the feeling that the company consider them as a part
of their culture. But on the other side, the Khunsoonthornkit and Panjakajornsak (2018) has
argued that the sometime too much dependency over the organizational culture impact the retail
businesses diverting from their main goal. It means the management of retail sector business get
divert from their main goals or target because of high focus on employee motivation and
building positive organization culture.
Marketing or market entry strategy of Sainsbury’s
With the help of STP analysis that is market segmentation, targeting and positioning strategy of
Sainsbury’s, the strategies that the company have adopted in order to enter and exist in the
market will be highlighted.
STP analysis of Sainsbury’s
Market segmentation: It refers to dividing the market groups of buyers on the basis of their
different requirements (Mothersbaugh and et.al., 2020). Sainsbury’s has segmented the whole of

its target audience as the shoppers of daily need goods and other groceries item through online
and offline modes. Sainsbury’s is known for segmenting the market on the basis of almost all the
variables such as geographically, demographically, psychographic and behaviorally. In terms of
demographic segmentation, the company has product offerings for people belonging from all
income and age group, sex, religion, nationality and race. Also, Sainsbury’s has established its
retail outlets and stores in almost all cities of UK which indicates company’s geographic
segmentation of the market. Furthermore, Sainsbury’s have segmented the market on the basis of
psychographic variable as well which proves to be valuable for the company. Several benefits
that Sainsbury’s is enjoying as a result of appropriate market segmentation involves
improvements in customer service standards which has increases the sales volume and thus
profits of the company. Accordingly, it can be said that the company’s performance can be
improved if it has segmented its target audience appropriately.
Targeting: The target group of the company involves family unit that is, both individuals and
households (Morgan and et.al., 2019). For each different category of target group, Sainsbury’s
has devised unique promotional strategy for each of the segment it has been targeting and
accordingly, there are two segments through which Sainsbury’s is operating that is, the retail
segment and financial services segment where the former operates through convenience stores
and supermarkets while the latter operates through Sainsbury’s Bank plc. This shows how
Sainsbury’s exists in the market while targeting its chosen segment in the market.
Positioning or competitive advantage of Sainsbury’s in the market: The competitive
advantage that Sainsbury’s is enjoying in the market is that it has positioned itself as a provider
of varied products at a price that is affordable to all. Therefore, customer found prices of
Sainsbury’s product to be pocket friendly as compared to the close competitors such as Tesco
and ASDA.
Impact Analysis
This includes the impact of organization culture over the following area such as business,
employee, environment and society.
Impact on Sainsbury business:
The organizational culture plays crucial role towards the success of Sainsbury the impact
of which Sainsbury has become one of the third largest retailer organization in the UK. Further,

the revenue of Sainsbury organization has increasing year by year which means that the revenue
growth of business is depends upon its strong culture experiences. Sainsbury Plc basically uses
hierarchy as well as collaborative culture both in order to manage the work and keep their
employees motivated. With the help of its strong organization culture, Sainsbury able to turn
their employee into advocate. The company provide both monetary benefits and respect to their
employee in order to enhance their morale and productivity. Not only that, the impact of
organization culture over Sainsbury is that they able to retain the existing talents as well as hire
new talents in company because of its positive organization culture.
However, it is also analysed that the poor communication is one of the challenge faced by
Sainsbury in order to create positive organization culture This has to be understood by the
company that effective communication is the main part of organization culture and without it
they can't be able to achieve their target and whatever they want to attain (Seimon and et.al.,
2019).
Impact on employee:
The impact of organization culture over the employee is that their productivity increases,
morale and enthusiasm increases. The increase in the motivation level of employee is also one of
the impact of organization culture over employee. Employee of Sainsbury are highly motivated
and engaged in the success of the business because of the respect, incentives and recognition
they received from the company. From the secondary information, it is also analysed that
because of the organization culture of Sainsbury, the employee able to work harder even during
the peak time or high demand with the aim of achieving the ultimate goals and target of own as
well as company (Thirusanku, 2021). It is because Sainsbury align the company goal with the
individual personal goal or development. For example, in Sainsbury organization the
management will encourage their employee by giving them sharing in profit as well as ESOP. In
this way, it can be said that the impact of organization culture over the employee is that they able
to work harder and with full potential.
Impact on environment:
Sainsbury is one of the leading supermarket of UK and their organization culture has the
least impact over the environment. Basically, it is analysed that supermarket chains are

responsible for large carbon footprints. The organization culture of Sainsbury indicate that for
them and their employee, environment protection or sustainability management are their main
goal (Alzahmi and Ibrahim, 2021). The company usually adopt different ways in order to
become more environmental friendly the impact of which they able to minimize the ecological
damages that cause due to its operations. In addition, the impact of Sainsbury culture over
environment is that the plastic waste is reduces. It is because Sainsbury is highly contributed or
focused towards the plastic waste crises and to reduce plastic waste they use single use plastic
packaging.
Impact on society:
Society are highly influenced by the culture of the organization and how the company
function its various operation and financial tasks. The impact of organization culture of
Sainsbury over the society is that their brand image in the eye of society has increased. In the
present time, people or consumer are more preferring healthy foods due to various diseases
especially after Covid-19 (Seimon and et.al., 2019). In order to tackle with this issue, Sainsbury
company has started producing healthy food item for its local as well as international customer.
This indicates that culture of Sainsbury is formed in such a way that their employee such as
marketing team put close eye over its customer and society demand in order to meet their taste
and demand. Further, the impact of organization culture of Sainsbury over society is that the
company provides high employment opportunity to freshers. The details of food products such as
where they come from is provided by Sainsbury marketing team to customer on social media
platform under the Fair trade movement.
12 Constraints
Here 12 different constraints will be stated with that have been faced while
accomplishing this project, such as the following:
Formulation of aims and objectives: While framing aims & objectives, researcher found it
difficult to narrow down the scope of the objectives because broad aim & objectives make it
impossible to enhance the level of focus of the study.

Implementation of method adopted for data collection: Due to extensively adopting the
secondary data collection method, it becomes challenging to read large books, journals and
articles to gather required data for the research (Russo and et.al., 2021).
Fund arrangement: financial constraints always remain at its place when any project is
undertaken. This make it challenging to manage the project undertaken. Only personal finances
are used for funding the project which acts as a constraint on using primary data collection
method because it is quite a costly affair.
Technical constraint: In order to analyze the searched data, it is necessary to apply several
application tools where researcher being technically unsound found it difficult to apply the same.
This makes it impossible to gather quantitative data and the research is completed on the basis of
qualitative data only.
Culture: Researcher found it difficult to interact with people belonging from different cultural
practices and following different working styles or customs while fulfilling the requirements of
the project (Acar, Tarakci and Van Knippenberg, 2019).
Knowledge: Researcher have limited knowledge of theories associated with organizational
culture along with the software that are used for analyzing quantitative data.
Recruitment: In order to recruit sources such as books and journals for gathering secondary
data, researcher found it difficult in ensuring its validity and reliability as most of the data are not
updated one.
Ethics: To ensure the confidentiality of data gathered from the source is a big constraint of every
research and this research is no exception.
Time: It is challenging for the researcher to accomplish all the tasks of the project in a duration
of just 10 days as secondary sources of information requires justified selection.
Information accessibility: Several sources of information are paid and having restricted access
which leads to a big challenge for research in accessible reliable information within the given
budget constraint (Guran, 2022).
Lack of encouragement: As the project is done individually, there found lack of encouragement
while completing the project.
Mentorship: There is a very limited assistance from experts and professionals of the field as the
research is extensively based on secondary sources of information and the researcher is having
very low budget. Accordingly, lack of mentorship was another big constraint for the researcher.

CONCLUSION
After summing up the above information, it has been analysed that organization culture
have both positive and negative impact over the performance of company. The report has come
to this conclusion with the use of secondary method as a data collection method. It has been also
concluded that Sainsbury uses both hierarchy and collaborative culture within the organization in
order to keep maintain and create positive culture at workplace. The impact of which they have
became third largest company in UK. The competitive advantage of Sainsbury has been analysed
from the STP analysis of company. Lastly, through impact analysis it has been summarized that
the impact of Sainsbury organization culture over the business, employee, environment and
society is good.

REFERENCES
Books and journals
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study. International Journal of Economics and Management. 24(2). pp.264-278.
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performance in the private secondary school in Palembang. International Journal of
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organizational culture on job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and employee’s
performance. South Asian Journal of Business Studies.
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satisfaction, personality, and organizational commitment towards employee
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Ameen, A. M., Ahmed, M. F. and Abd Hafez, M. A., 2018. The impact of management
accounting and how it can be implemented into the organizational culture. Dutch
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Khunsoonthornkit, A. and Panjakajornsak, V., 2018. Thai Research and Development
Organization Performance: A Structural Equation Model Analysis of Organizational
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